A SYDNEY TRAGEDY.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2455, 24 January 1893, Page 1

A SYDNEY TRAGEDY.

A terrible tragedy was enacted in Woolloomooloo, N.S.W., at about noon on the 12th, when a man named Van Kaspelen, a well-known crayon artist of Sydney, shot a woman named Annie C. Wilson in mistake for his own wife, and then shot himself. Death in both cases was instantaneous. Van Kaspelen rented a room in the house occupied by Mr and Mrs Wilson, George Edwards, Mrs Wilson’s brother, and three young men boarders. About a month ago Mrs Van Kaspelen, through her husband’s drinking habits and cruelty towards her, decided to live apart fvuw him. Van Kaspelen continued to live at Wilson’s house ; tind in his absence Mrs Van Kaspelen occasionally visited the house to see Mrs Wilson, with whom she was on very friendly terms, Mrs Van Kaspelen and Mrs Wilson were in personal appearance and stature very much alike, and at a few yards distance might easily be mistaken for one another. Van Kaspelen had been drinking heavily, and about noon he returned home, and there is no doubt that he went there with the intention of shooting his wife, who he believed was at the house, There was was no one at home, at the time except Mrs Wilson. and it is thought that seeing her- in the kitchen and mistaking her for his wife he fired at her, the bullet entering her left eye 'and killing her instantaneously. He then must have attempted to shoot himself through the head, as his hat was found in the kitchen with a bullet hole in it, and a bullet was found lodged in the, kitchen ceiling. After this it seems that Van Kaspelen went upstairs to, his room, locked the door, and fired twice at himself, two bullets lodging in his head. He seems from surrounding appearances to have fallen back on the bed dead. The first to arrive at the house was Mrs Van Kaspelen, and she was followed by George Edwards. Finding hia sister lying dead on the flooi’j and judging it must have been Van Kaspelen who committed the deed, Edwards rushed upstairs with the intention, as he said himself, of throttling him, and he then discovered that the bedroom was locked. H e burst it open and found Van Kaspelen dead on the bed. Mrs Wilson was twenty-five years of ago. She was engaged in preparing her husband’s mid-day meal when she was murdered.